You know you're at Stanford when: you can do your finals from Los Angeles

I spoke with Serafim and he is anxious to get started as soon as possible on my research rotation. He was hoping to begin at the start of the quarter, but Gill would like me to stay through for the full 10 weeks. Gill started at Stanford late, and so I was not able to keep to a normal quarterly schedule, and he has somewhat insisted I stay until the 11th of April after a meeting I had with him on Tuesday.

On Wednesday we had a good talk in the lab, and I really need to step up my work to finish up as soon as possible so I can move on to Serafim's rotation, who has a really great project suggested. I spoke with him the same day and he believes we may be able to get a publication in the 10 week time!!! I am also very much looking forward to the rotation as Pavel Pevzner, at UCSD, was extremely excited about his work and had encouraged me to try to work with him.

On Wednesday night I had decided to reward myself with some shopping, but as I don't really have the time to window shop, I ended up doing it online. I have decided that online shopping is COMPLETELY dangerous for 2 main reasons! One is that it is so much easier to shop and spend a large amount of money in a much shorter period, since we don't need to go around and try things on, but also there are too many sales incentives that easy to find with minimal effort. The second is that it really does not satiate my desire to shop! I do not feel like I have shopped if I do it online. I think I may have replaced my addiction for shopping with coffee, which is good since I can get it for free virtually all the time, either at school or at home. However, I have occasional shopping relapses! The bag I bought is HUGE (see right). It fits my 17 inch laptop!

On Thursday I drove down to LA, and then spent the entire evening working on a presentation for my talk on Friday at my old high school, Beverly Hills High. Running on 3 hours of sleep, I arrived at 830 AM to give a talk to the Computer Science class of my former high school CS teacher, Mr. Paul. He's really great and has a great vision for incorporating CS into a general high school curriculum, and believes I have a great example of how this has been done and why it is so important!

At 930am I spoke to the AP Biology class, who were so extremely receptive. I have to honestly say that I was NOT this advanced in high school. The students were asking some VERY impressive questions,and were totally interested in the field. I had a 2 hour break until my last talk with the faculty at lunch, and tried to nap in the library at BHHS. I was on the floor until I decided I needed to get some food at the nearby mall! At lunch I gave my talk a 3rd time, and actually had a great conversation with a Biology teacher about a way to integrate some Bioinformatics into his curriculum. Hopefully he will contact me!

That evening I had plans to go to the high school play with my friend, Tracy (it is my last chance since her younger brother will graduate this year)! We first went shopping, then I had dinner with my family, but by the time it was 630, I realized that I was NOT going to be able to go as Alex called me and reminded me I had to turn in our Final!!!!! So I rushed home, and finished up (YAY ALL DONE WITH FINALS!!!!!!!!!) and promptly fell asleep.

I woke up around 11 when my mom was headed to bed, and checked my email. I found a message had been sent to me by my friend Angela on facebook, and it said I should check the NSF website. OH NO! I did NOT want to know! She clearly must have gotten one and it must have been announced! I have no emails in my inbox from the helpdesk!!! (If you all remember, I had to do it for practice in the fall and was certain I had a great research proposal which I slept on for 2 hours and had changed my mind)! I check, and yes, Angela is listed! BUT OH MY GOD! MY NAME IS ON THE FIRST PAGE!!!!!

My left hand ring finger tip instantly tingles (isn't that a heart attack? Didn't I break that finger?!) I look at it about 100 times, and then I look at the number, 931 students, that's about right. It has to be a mistake! I call Angela, and she is completely calm, and we are still discussing the possibility it is a mistake. I look on my account and see a letter drafted with my address. Can it be?! Is IT REAL!? I had just been talking about it a few days earlier, how I was certain I would not get it since I had dreams I might.

I decided to be on the safe side and not email thanks to my recommenders until I was certain I had won the fellowship, but still decided to have a pseudo-celebration, if for no other reason than that the quarter is over, and went out to Jerry's Deli with Shirley and Ryan.

The next day Ryan and I head down to San Diego for an afternoon, and I check my email on my cell phone on the ride, and there it is! The email from Russ! Congratulating me on getting the fellowship!!!!! I guess it is real!?!??!

We spent the evening with his family, eating and helping his sister out with her homework assignment. Later we head out to Il Fornaio and have dessert and coffee with Ryan's former roommate, Sahand (we seem to meet with him at Il Fornaio every time). Ryan decides we should head back to Los Angeles that night, so unfortunately we miss the opportunity to see all our other friends down there!

The next day I had a hair appointment! I colored my hair....dark brown! I had been considering it for ages, and I had finally found the perfect color, Cameron Diaz! Now, I know I look nothing like her, but I LOVE her color, and if he had the nerve to go from platinum blonde to black, I can go from blonde highlights to dark brown! And so I did it! I have never gotten such a strange mix of reaction! Initially everyone is simply shocked! But eventually people warm up to it. Here are some reactions:
My Mother (very calmly and matter-of-factly): "Oh my god, that is dark, it looks like a wig."
My aunt Karen (not calm): "WHAT DID YOU DO?! People pay to have your hair!!" (I pay to have my other hair also)
My uncle: "Karen!!! Sarah, it looks very nice!"
My aunt later said, "you are right, it does make your eyes stand out."
My grandmother: "Oh Sar!" Then about an hour later. "Well, it's still you."
Shirley, Sahand, and Ryan all "LOVE IT"!
Oliver "You should have gone darker"
My friend Joe "What did you do? I love blonde."

It has been such an array of responses, but I have started to realize, that age old adage of "If you have nothing good to say, it is best to say nothing at all" is very true. The fact is, Joe Schmo who meets me on the street will never know that I had blonde hair before, and will like it all the same. The opinion is purely based on the shock and comparison. And when they have a frame of reference, they will say something, regardless, because they can have an opinion since they have both views. I am trying to stay positive! It is pretty scary for me too!!!!

I decided I had to take my "hair out" on Sunday so we went to our local dig, Barney's Beanery. I got some great reaction from people I've never met, including this guy's reaction. Okay, that was actually induced by the Tabasco, mustard, pepper, sweet and low concoction we made him which he drank, but he did say "you are pretty". Although he was so drunk, I'm not even quite sure he was saying it to me! I know it was mean but it's not like we made him drink it, and he was perfectly aware of what he was having because we asked him to guess the ingredients and, while he didn't get the Sweet and Low, he did get the mustard and Tabasco sauce right.